President Václav Klaus of the Czech Republic has appealed to Greek president Karolos Papoulias via a letter addressing the imprisonment of ArmA 3 developers Ivan Buchta and Martin Pezlar.
According to Klaus’s letter, he is paying “special attention” to the matter and hopes whatever the outcome may be that it doesn’t cause an “unnecessary shade” to fall upon relations between the countries.
“I would like to address a matter of two Czech citizens who were arrested in Greece and charged with espionage,” Klaus wrote. “This case is very sensitive to the Czech public and also to me as President of the Republic. The fate of our citizens anywhere in the world matters to us.
“I have no doubt that the democratic Greek authorities – police, prosecutors and the courts – will consider this unfortunate matter impartially and independently. Even I do not in any way want to interfere with their work.
“I want to ask you, Mr. President, to follow this unfortunate affair with special attention considering the excellent relations between our nations so this does not throw unnecessary shade onto our relationship.
“Once again, I want to assure you that I have the utmost certainty that our accused citizens will be given all the rights in the search for justice by the Greek authorities.”
Buchta and Pezlar have been charged with espionage by the Greek government for alleged photographs taken of of Greek military installations.
Jailed since September, it was revealed last week the duo had been denied and appeal in the case as well as bail, which means the men will have to face trial in a Greek court.
Buchta and Pezlar face up to 20 years in a Greek prison if convicted.
Double Fine Amnesia Fortnight adds Brazen prototype
Those who donate more than the average price – currently sitting at $6.51 – will receive a copy of Brazen, playable on PC.
Brazen is a four-player co-op online game in the works at Double Fine; the project is being led by Brad Muir, who helmed Iron Brigade (nee Trenched). Apparently inspired by classic Hollywood films like Sinbad, Jason and the Argonauts, and the original Clash of the Titans, the action affair boasts three classes, the Stalwart, Waracle and Beerzerker.
Check out a video below, but remember – this is a prototype and likely to be pretty rough, and there’s no guarantee it will make it to release.
Double Fine’s Amnesia Fortnight allows fans to vote on which pitches it should develop into prototypes, and eventually, which is the best one.
Steam has 50M users, more big numbers per LGC 2012 talk
Steam has 50 million users with up to 5 million playing concurrently, according to SEGA’s John Clark. Speaking during the London Games Conference, Clark was speaking of the importance of community in PC gaming, according toPCGamesN. Clark also said Steam’s Big Picture beta currently has 500,000 subscribers, and Steam Workshop has 300,000 items with 106 million community contributions. Lots of big numbers there.
Steam for Linux beta expanded to 5,000 more users
Valve has a small holiday present for Linux users; a further 5,000 volunteer testers have been given the green light for its Ubuntu client beta. If you signed up, be sure to check your inbox and spam folders carefully, and you could be playing Left 4 Dead 2 over the long weekend. Valve says it is making good progress in smoothing out the test client, which was first made available to testers in early November.
